INTERDISCIPLINARY AREAS OF KNOWLEDGEEducational Sciences (Child and Educational Psychology, Sociology of Education, Political Science of Education, Economics of Education, Anthropology of Education, Neurosciences and Early Learning, Educational Disciplines)

Study programme type

university

Study level

integrated undergraduate and graduate

Study programme

Integrated graduate and graduate study of Primary School Education

Academic title abbreviation

mag.prim.educ.

Genre

master's thesis

Language

Croatian

Defense date

2016-07-15

Parallel abstract (English)

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), one of the most common
psychiatric disorder in childhood, is characterized by a lack of attention, excessive impulsiveness and hyperactivity. It is estimated that nowadays there is at least one student with ADHD in every classroom, therefore the teacher needs to know the characteristics of these students and teaching methods.
The study included 233 male and female teachers who work in primary and elementary schools in Istra, Primorje-Gorski Kotar and the area of the city of Karlovac. The Scale Teachers knowledge about ADHD (Soroa et al., 2014) was used in this study.
Small number of teachers have made IEP for students with ADHD. Teachers perceived moderatly knowledge and competences for teaching students with ADHD, which are acquired mostly during informal education. Just one third of teachers reported support from psychologist and pedagogue and tenth from social pedagogue Also, they perceived moderate support recieved from all of them.
Higher level of knowledge about students with ADHD have teachers who work in primary schools in Primorje-Gorski Kotar and those who have learned about students with ADHD.
Considering that there are no similiar researches in Croatia, the aim of this study was determined the level of teachers knowledge about ADHD. Like in other similiar researches, results are indicating underlever knowledge about characteristics of those students and insufficient evaluation of teachers personal competences for teaching those students. It is neccesary to introduce contents of teaching students with difficulties, more specific with ADHD, during formal education initial and proffesional development to avoid that teachers main source of information comes from informal education. Success of teaching students with ADHD depends also on support of proffesional associates and local community.